About the race

An Epic adventure and a record to be broken

A fantastic bluewater race course: 3,570 NM of trade-wind sailing. The current record, set in 2008, is 11 days 10 hours 13 minutes 18 seconds.

A race will be organized every four years between Los Angeles and Tahiti, a mystical destination that all sailors dream about.

A race looking at the future

In 1925, the Tahiti Race was the word longest ocean race, and because of its history, she must today initiate the revival of ocean racing. A technical committee has been specially set up to create this new format of race.

The Notice of race is available on this website. You can already pre-register with TPYC.

Racing divisions will be organized by one- design and length overall (LOA). Onboard transponders will enable real-time tracking which will allow the general public to follow the action online.

For a class to be constituted, it will need to have at least five boats. The organizers reserve the right to agree to open new classes based on possibilities and requests.

The minimum umber of boats required to officially stage Transpac’2020 is 4.

The maximum number of boats able to participate is restricted to 30.

Revival of ocean racing

For decades, competitors in the world’s most prestigious and challenging around-the-world races have followed courses south of the Southern Hemisphere’s Great Capes.

How many prestigious sailors have therefore passed south of French Polynesia, flirting with the pole, without ever discovering anything about the “invisible continent” constituted by Polynesia and Melanesia?

It’s high time a major ocean race began to celebrate the South Seas, in the form of a first-class transpacific event!

Among the possible routes in the world’s largest ocean, which covers half of the planet’s ocean surface, the course from Los Angeles to Tahiti requires traveling a straight-line distance of 3575 NM (or a just over 30 NM more than the Route du Rhum).

Along a south-southwest axis, crossing the terrestrial equator and the meteorological equator—the famous ITCZ referred to as the «doldrums»—the record is currently held by Magnitude80, skippered by Doug Baker, and established in 2008 (the previous one dating back to 1994) at 11 days, 10 hours, 13 minutes and 18 seconds (average speed: 13.0 knots).

Tahiti race record would seem ripe for the plucking.

An ocean race on the road to the 36th America’s Cup

Tahiti is on the way west from any yacht migrating to New Zealand from the winter Carribean season.

Yet besides those hunting down race record opportunities there is another group that may be very interested in the Tahiti Race 2020:

Maxis, Superyachts and those migrating west from their 2019-20 winter season in the Caribbean towards Auckland in time for the events affiliated with the 2021 America’s Cup.